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>.  I G 

UNIVERSITY     OF     ILLINOIS     BULLETIN 

Issued  Weekly 
Vol.  XX  April  2,  1923  No.  31 

[Entered  as  second-class  matter  December  11,  1912,  at  the  post  office  at  Urbana,  Illinois,  under  the 
Act  of  August  24,  1912.  Accepted  for  mailing  at  the  special  rate  of  postage  provided  for  in 
Section   1103,  Act  of  October  3,   1917,  authorized  July  31,    1918.] 


EDUCATIONAL  RESEARCH  CIRCULAR  NO.  16 


BUREAU  OF  EDUCATIONAL  RESEARCH 
COLLEGE  OF  EDUCATION 

THE  EFFECT  OF  ATTENDANCE  UPON 
SCHOOL  ACHIEVEMENT 

By 

Charles  W.  Odell 

Associate,  Bureau  of  Educational  Research 


PUBLISHED  BY  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 
URBANA 


370 

tl  o .  I& 


The  Effect  of  Attendance  Upon  School  Achievement 

In  connection  with  a  recent  experiment1  in  the  promotion  and 
classification  of  pupils  the  writer  had  to  determine  the  placement  of 
a  large  number  of  pupils.  As  a  basis  for  so  doing  various  items  of 
information  concerning  each  pupil  were  collected.  Among  these  items 
was  a  record  of  the  scores  made  upon  several  intelligence  and  achieve- 
ment tests.  These  tests  were  given  near  the  close  of  each  of  the  sev- 
eral semesters  that  the  experiment  continued.  The  attendance  record 
showed  the  percent  of  time  that  each  pupil  was  present  from  the  first 
of  each  semester  until  the  time  the  tests  were  given.  In  the  case  of 
pupils  who  were  not  enrolled  at  the  first  of  the  semester  their  attend- 
ance records  were  computed  on  the  basis  of  the  time  elapsing  after 
they  entered.  Another  item  of  information  secured  was  the  average 
school  mark.  This  mark  was  given  by  the  classroom  teacher  and  was 
the  average  of  the  marks  made  in  the  following  seven  subjects,  or  in 
as  many  of  them  as  the  pupil  happened  to  be  carrying:  Arithmetic, 
English,  Geography,  History,  Reading,  Spelling  and  Writing.  It  was 
computed  for  the  same  period  of  time  as  the  percent  of  attendance, 
that  is,  from  the  first  of  the  semester  until  the  time  that  the  tests 
were  given. 

In  carrying  out  the  placement  of  pupils  it  was  in  many  cases 
necessary  to  confer  with  the  various  teachers  taking  part  in  the  ex- 
periment. In  discussing  what  effect  the  attendance  record  of  a  pupil 
should  have  upon  his  placement  these  teachers  expressed  two  opin- 
ions that  were  radically  different.  Many  of  them  believed  that  if  a 
pupil  had  been  absent  any  considerable  portion  of  a  semester  he 
should  not  be  promoted  at  the  end  of  the  semester.  They  argued 
that  no  matter  how  bright  he  might  be  he  had  missed  a  certain 
amount  of  work  that  he  should  have  covered  and  should  not  go  ahead 
until  he  had  completed  it.  Furthermore,  if  it  was  suspected  that 
attendance  had  been  poor  largely  as  the  result  of  disinclination  to 
attend  school  these  teachers  believed  that  it  was  only  just  that  the 


^This  experiment  is  described  in  Bulletin  No.  12  of  the  Bureau  of  Educational 
Research. 

[3] 


pupil  should  be  penalized  by  being  failed.  They  said  that  if  he  were 
allowed  to  go  ahead  it  would  produce  the  impression  that  attendance 
was  not  an  important  matter  and  thus  encourage  further  truancy. 
On  the  other  hand  many  teachers  took  the  opposite  viewpoint.  If  a 
pupil  had  done  rather  poor  work  during  the  semester  because  of  a 
large  amount  of  absence  they  said  that  if  his  ability  justified  it  he 
should  not  be  denied  promotion.  This  was  supported  by  the  argu- 
ment that  the  pupil  would  have  been  able  to  do  the  work  if  he  had 
been  present  and  therefore  should  not  be  held  back.  This  argument 
was  of  course  applied  only  in  the  cases  of  pupils  of  average  or  supe- 
rior ability.  Furthermore,  it  was  said  that  in  the  case  of  a  pupil  who 
stayed  out  of  school  because  he  disliked  to  attend  the  condition  would 
be  made  worse  by  failing  him  as  this  would  result  in  still  greater 
dislike  of  school.  Because  of  these  two  radically  divergent  viewpoints 
the  writer  was  interested  in  making  a  study  of  the  question  named 
above  in  order  to  see  what  effect  attendance  or  non-attendance 
actually  produces  upon  the  achievement  of  pupils. 

As  was  stated,  certain  achievement  tests  were  given  near  the 
end  of  each  of  the  several  semesters.  These  tests  covered  reading 
and  arithmetic  and  also  some  spelling  in  the  lower  grades.  The  scores 
made  thereon  were  converted  into  achievement  ages  and  quotients. 
By  computing  the  gain  from  one  testing  period  to  another  it  was 
possible  to  find  the  approximate  increase  in  achievement  age  during 
each  semester.  Table  I  shows  the  percent  of  pupils  included  in  each 
attendance  group,  their  median  achievement  age  at  the  end  of  the 
semester,  their  median  achievement  a-Uotient  at  the  same  time,  their 
median  increase  in  achievement  age  during  the  semester  and  their 
median  average  school  mark  for  this  time.  It  is  to  be  interpreted  as 
follows:  approximately  75.3  percent  of  all  pupils  attended  from 
91-100  percent  of  the  time.  This  group  had  a  median  achievement 
age  at  the  end  of  the  semester  of  11.1  years,  a  median  achievement 
quotient  of  107.8,  a  median  increase  in  achievement  age  of  1.4  years 
and  a  median  average  school  mark  of  3.I.1  From  the  third  column 
it  appears  that  there  is  a  definite  tendency  for  higher  achievement 


xThe  average  school  marks  were  computed  on  a  scale  of  5  points,  1  being  the 
poorest  and  5  the  best.  These  numerical  marks  were  equivalent  to  the  following  ex- 
pressions:   l=poor;  2=fair;   3=good;  4=excellent;   5=superior. 

[4] 


TABLE  I.   RELATION  OF  ATTENDANCE  TO  ACHIEVEMENT 
DURING  THE  SAME  SEMESTER 


Percent 

Percent 

Median 

Median 

Median 

Median 

of 

of  Pupils 

Achievement 

Achievement 

Increase 

Average 

Attendance 

Included 

Age 

Quotient 

in  A.  A. 

School  Mark 

91-100 

75.3 

11.1 

107.8 

1.4 

3.1 

81- 

15.9 

10.6 

107.2 

1.3 

2.9 

71- 

4.7 

10.4 

106.8 

1.2 

2.7 

61- 

1.7 

10.4 

105.4 

1.5 

2.6 

51- 

.8 

10.2 

109.2 

1.6 

2.4 

41- 

.7 

10.4 

113.3 

1.6 

2.5 

31- 

.3 

9.4 

103.3 

.0 

2.4 

21- 

.2 

9.2 

95.0 

.3 

2.4 

11- 

.2 

9.0 

103.3 

.5 

2.5 

1- 

.2 

9.9 

90.0 

1.5 

2.4 

All 

100.0 

11.0 

107.5 

1.4 

3.0 

No.  of  Cases 

23,036 

6,874 

13,746 

22,803 

ages  to  be  associated  with  better  attendance.  The  median  achieve- 
ment quotients  and  increases  in  achievement  age  show  this  tendency 
very  slightly  if  at  all.  There  is  a  small  increase  in  the  medians  of 
the  three  highest  attendance  groups  which  of  course  contain  the  bulk 
of  the  pupils.  But  on  the  other  hand  there  are  several  groups  lower 
than  these  whose  medians  are  larger.  The  lowest  medians  are,  how- 
ever, found  among  the  groups  that  have  poor  attendance  records. 
The  column  of  average  school  marks  tends  to  agree  with  column 
three.  Although  there  is  no  appreciable  change  one  way  or  another 
in  the  lower  half,  in  the  upper  the  medians  rather  steadily  increase 
along  with  better  attendance.  It  is  noteworthy,  however,  that  even 
in  the  group  with  the  lowest  percent  of  attendance  the  median  school 
mark  is  2.4,  or  almost  half-way  between  "fair"  and  "good." 

The  median  percents  of  attendance  for  all  pupils  of  each  given 
achievement  age,  quotient,  increase,  and  school  mark  were  also  com- 
puted. A  study  of  these  medians  shows  the  same  tendencies  that 
have  been  mentioned;  the  pupils  who  had  the  higher  achievement 
ages  and  school  marks  tended  to  be  those  with  the  higher  percents 
of  attendance,  whereas  this  was  very  slightly  if  at  all  true  in  the  case 
of  the  achievement  quotients  and  increases  in  achievement  age.  The 
evidence  presented  by  Table  I  and  the  medians  just  referred  to  is  a 


[5] 


little  conflicting.  A  common-sense  view  of  the  situation  would  appear 
to  be  that  attendance  during  a  given  semester  is  more  closely  asso- 
ciated with  the  work  done  during  that  semester,  that  is  the  increase 
in  achievement,  than  it  is  with  the  achievement  age  or  quotient  at 
the  end  of  the  semester,  which  represents  total  achievement  since 
entering  school.  This  is,  however,  apparently  not  the  case  in  so  far 
as  the  figures  given  above  show.  The  evidence  of  the  school  marks 
tends  to  corroborate  what  we  should  expect,  that  the  pupils  who  at- 
tend better  secure  higher  marks. 

Partly  because  of  this  unexpected  result  and  partly  for  other 
reasons  it  was  thought  desirable  to  study  the  relation  of  attendance 
during  one  semester  to  achievement  during  the  next.  Table  II  pre- 
sents the  same  data  as  certain  of  the  columns  of  Table  I  except  that 
they  are  computed  for  the  semester  following  that  for  which  the  at- 
tendance was  taken.  The  data  in  this  table  do  not  show  strikingly  dif- 
ferent tendencies  from  those  in  Table  I.  Perhaps  the  most  noteworthy 
difference  is  that  the  median  increases  in  achievement  age  for  the  three 
lowest  attendance  groups  are  very  high.  A  possible  explanation  for  this 
is  that  the  pupils  in  these  groups  tended  to  make  small  increases  during 
the  same  semester  for  which  the  attendance  record  was  taken  and 
therefore  during  the  following  semester  they  balanced  this  by  mak- 
ing unusually  large  ones.  This  might  have  been  caused  by  pressure 
on  the  part  of  the  teacher  or  hard  effort  and  diligent  application  on 
the  part  of  the  pupils.  The  tendency  for  the  median  average  school 
mark  to  increase  along  with  attendance  is  somewhat  less  noticeable 
than  was  shown  by  the  data  in  Table  I  but  is  still  present. 

Summing  up  the  evidence  it  appears  (1)  that  the  percent  of 
time  which  a  pupil  attends  school  has  a  rather  definite  effect  upon 
his  achievement  age  at  the  end  of  the  period  under  consideration, 
(2)  that  it  has  practically  no  effect  upon  his  actual  increase  in  achieve- 
ment age  unless  his  attendance  record  is  very  poor  in  which  case  it 
lessens  it  for  the  same  semester  and  increases  it  for  the  following 
one,  and  (3)  that  it  is  fairly  closely  related  to  his  average  school 
mark  for  the  same  semester  and  somewhat  less  so  to  that  for  the 
following  one.  On  the  whole  the  attendance  appears  to  be  a  factor 
conditioning  achievement  but  not  so  weighty  a  factor  as  many  have 
believed. 


[6] 


TABLE  II.   RELATION  OF  ATTENDANCE  TO  ACHIEVEMENT 
DURING  THE  FOLLOWING  SEMESTER 


Percent 

Percent 

Median 

Median 

of 

of  Pupils 

Increase 

Average 

Attendance 

Included 

in  A.  A. 

School  Mark 

91-100 

75.3 

1.3 

3.1 

81- 

15.9 

1.5 

3.0 

71- 

4.7 

1.0 

2.9 

61- 

1.7 

1.1 

2.9 

51- 

.8 

.8 

2.6 

41- 

.7 

.8 

2.9 

31- 

.3 

1.9 

2.7 

21- 

.2 

3.0 

3.0 

11- 

.2 

2.5 

2.9 

1- 

.2 

3.3 

3.1 

All 

100.0 

1.3 

3.1 

No.  of  Cases 

7,074 

12,773 

In  connection  with  this  study  of  attendance  it  was  thought  worth 
while  to  determine  whether  or  not  pupils  tend  to  be  present  at  school 
about  the  same  percent  of  the  time  semester  after  semester.  In  other 
words,  are  most  of  the  pupils  who  attend  rather  regularly  any  one 
given  semester  likely  to  do  so  during  the  succeeding  one  and  vice 
versa?  In  order  to  answer  this  question  the  attendance  records  dur- 
ing the  first  and  second  semester  of  the  same  school  year  were  cor- 
related. The  coefficient  of  correlation  was  found  to  be  .19  ±  .01, 
which  indicates  that  there  is  a  small  but  definite  amount  of  correla- 
tion. This  is  further  shown  by  computing  the  median  percent  of 
attendance  for  the  second  semester  of  each  of  the  ten-percentile 
groups  for  the  first.  Although  these  medians  do  not  run  in  regular 
order  they  show  on  the  whole  an  increase  from  the  lower  groups  to 
the  higher.  This  is  especially  marked  in  the  six  highest  groups.  A 
similar  condition  is  found  when  the  attendance  groups  for  the  second 
semester  are  compared  with  the  corresponding  medians  for  the  first. 
These  data  would  seem  to  point  to  the  fact  that  poor  attendance  is 
not  caused  by  persistent  truancy  so  often  as  has  been  supposed.  It 
must  be  remembered,  however,  that  these  data  were  secured  from  a 
portion  of  the  Chicago  school  system  and  that  in  this  system  the 


[7] 


compulsory  attendance  department  is  rather  efficient,  enough  so  that 
it  is  difficult  for  pupils  to  be  absent  without  a  good  cause  very  long 
at  a  time. 

Another  matter  of  interest  is  whether  or  not  there  is  any  relation 
between  the  intelligence  of  pupils  and  their  attendance  at  school.  In 
order  to  investigate  this  the  records  of  those  pupils  who  were  in 
school  during  the  four  semesters  for  which  data  were  obtained  were 
studied.  The  average  intelligence  quotient  resulting  from  four  mental 
tests1  was  correlated  with  the  average  attendance  during  four  semes- 
ters. These  data  were  complete  for  almost  4000  pupils.  The  coeffi- 
cient of  correlation  was  found  to  be  .06  ±  .01,  which  shows  that 
there  was  practically  no  correlation.  A  study  of  the  medians  supports 
this.  The  median  I.  Q.  for  the  pupils  who  attended  from  91  to  100 
percent  of  the  time  was  the  highest  of  that  of  any  of  the  groups,  but 
except  for  this  the  medians  do  not  show  any  general  tendency  in 
either  way.  There  is  also  a  very  slight  tendency  for  the  median  per- 
cents  of  attendance  of  the  groups  having  different  intelligence  quo- 
tients to  increase.  We  are  not  justified,  however,  in  concluding  from 
this  study  that  there  is  any  relation  between  intelligence  and  attend- 
ance in  school. 

Those  who  wish  to  compare  the  attendance  records  of  their 
pupils  with  those  of  the  pupils  in  this  experiment  may  do  so  by 
means  of  the  second  column  in  each  of  the  two  tables.  This  shows 
that  approximately  three-fourths  of  the  pupils  attended  from  91  to 
100  percent  of  the  time.  The  median  attendance  for  all  pupils  con- 
cerned was  94.4  percent.  It  was  also  found  that,  although  consid- 
ering the  semesters  separately  about  2.2  percent  of  the  pupils  attended 
less  than  61  percent  of  the  time,  when  the  average  attendance  of 
those  pupils  in  school  during  the  whole  four  semesters  was  computed 
only  about  .2  percent  had  attended  less  than  61  percent  of  the  total 
time.  This  is  what  might  be  expected  from  the  fact  that  the  corre- 
lation of  attendance  in  succeeding  semesters  was  found  to  be  rather 
low. 


*In  some  cases  the  pupils  were  tested  with  two  different  mental  tests,  one  of 
which  was  used  three  times,  whereas  in  others  three  different  tests  were  used,  one 
of  them  being  used  twice. 

[8] 


A 


X- 


